Echoes of the Headmaster
by Hazuzu
Summary: During the reign of the Carrows, a Hogwarts student tries to end her life. A remnant of Dumbledore seeks to stay her hand.


This story was written for the 7th Round of the Seventh Season of the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition. I'm writing as Chaser 3 for The Tutshill Tornados.

**Name of Round:** Not My Department

**My task this round is as follows:** Department of Mysteries: Write about someone trying to solve something, figure something out, or understand something

**These are the prompts I'm using to as a chaser to score some extra points:**

1\. (word) imitation  
13\. (object) picture frame  
15\. hopeful

**Disclaimer:** I don't own any part of Harry Potter.

Thanks to all my betas!

**WARNING:** Suicide, self-harm

**Title:** Echoes of the Headmaster

**Word Count:** 2827 (Google Docs)

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~End of Author's Notes~

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"A-Avada..." The word hung on Kelly's lips and in the air, in the chill, still air that sunk into every crevice.

The room was perfectly clean. The chairs and tables were up against the walls and every inch of the floor, walls, and ceiling had been magically scoured. But still, Kelly found it hard to breathe. There was a pressure on her lungs, in her heart, boring down on her skull, and there was only one way to escape it.

"Av..." Kelly's scarred fingers trembled on the handle of her wand. Not only her hands were covered in pink scars, still fresh. They traced a pattern all across her body. Even when she was clean, even with her uniform torn to the floor, they stung.

But not so much as her head.

"Ava..." A hundred images flashed in Kelly's eyes: a tombstone, a dozen miserable masks in the Great Hall, the dead looks in the eyes of the Carrows... She wanted all of them gone. Nothing could be sweeter than a flash of green. She'd seen it done. She knew how it worked. She knew she could do it.

Hot tears poured down Kelly's cheeks. The point of her wand dug into her jaw. Her breath came out as ragged whispers.

"Avada..." Cowardice claimed Kelly and her wand fell from her fingers. It clattered on the cool stone floor, and she fell onto her hands. There was no threat of death, no precipice under her feet, but breathing hadn't become any easier. There was still no hope.

"Hello, Miss Brewes." The voice shook Kelly from her stupor. She grabbed her robe, covered herself, and twisted on the ground. There was nobody else in the dim light of the room. Just her, the furniture, and the picture frame hanging on the wall. One that was stretching and shifting over itself. The wood warped inward, as though manipulated by an unseen craftsman. Dark wood made way for pale, and pale for colors that had not been there before, until an occupant could be seen in the remnants of the frame.

A new occupant that was looking right at her.

"I was wandering by..." A grainy-skinned hand rubbed the edge of the picture frame. "And I wondered whether an attentive ear might interest you."

Kelly stared at the picture frame, at the fluffy white beard, the piercing eyes hidden behind half-moon spectacles, and the robes that provided the only light in the darkness. Her eyes could have been playing tricks, but her ears allowed no mistake. That voice could only be Dumbledore.

"P-Professor?" Kelly clutched her robe to herself. "This… You're..."

"Dead. I am aware," the portrait of Dumbledore said calmly, as though he were merely pointing out a bird in the sky. "And that is unlikely to change soon. It is good, then, that there is still hope for you." He looked around in the picture frame, but it was empty. It had been empty, just a wooden back. Kelly was sure no portraits should have been able to wander in.

"Professor..." Kelly dropped her robe. What did it matter whether he saw her? He was a ghost, an illusion, something that bore no judgment and had no will. "No. This is stupid." Her breath hitched even as she said it. "You can't help."

"I can't?" Dumbledore quirked a fluffy eyebrow at her.

"No. You're not him, you're not Dumbledore. You're only a portrait. An imitation." Kelly glared to the side.

"That does not mean I cannot help," Dumbledore said softly.

"Yes, it does!" Kelly barked. It bounced off of the walls and back into her ears. She didn't mean to yell. Not at Dumbledore, not even his portrait, but the storm of emotions that had carried her to the room hadn't left.

"If I am merely a portrait, you can say whatever you wish and not another soul will know. Speak to me, how you have not spoken to anyone else, and see whether it helps. If it doesn't… I cannot stop you from retrieving your wand and casting that spell. It is only in my power to provide an ear, and perhaps share a few words that may ease your pain. But I cannot understand without your help"

Kelly slowly turned to look at Dumbledore, at his wrinkled old face, his grace even in so dismal a place, and at his eyes. They looked at her with no judgment, no suspicion, not even the despair she saw in so many of the other students. Perhaps he could figure out how to dispel her anguish.

"I don't know where to start," Kelly said. "I don't know where it comes from. There are a bunch of things and no things, and it's all too much, and I can't speak to anyone, and people won't speak to me, and it's not getting any better, and..." Her tongue was heavy with the burden of memory. Organizing her thoughts would only make it worse.

"Take your time." Dumbledore had conjured a chair from somewhere and sat down when she wasn't looking. His slender fingers were knitted together on top of his silk robes.

"We buried Dad in the Summer. Just before school. He was a good guy, y'know? I know everyone says that, unless they're a real jerk, but he was. He didn't even know about magic until he met Mum and me, and he didn't get it, but he helped. He helped when it got hard, and he helped me relax, and when I didn't get into the Quidditch team, he got some normal brooms and a bunch of sports balls and practiced with me all through the break." She wanted to laugh, but it came out as a sob.

"He sounds a gentle fellow," Dumbledore said. "The kind there ought to be more of. You have my condolences, Miss Brewes."

"Yeah..." Kelly shook her head. "We didn't know what it was. Freak accident. Death happens, you move on, but you don't. Every day happens, and I wake up and think maybe I'll get to see him again, just for a few seconds..." She rubbed her eyes with her robe, but they refused to dry. "And it's like it happened again. And I think..." She bit her lip. She had to be able to speak. She'd already failed herself with the incantation. She could at least form words.

"Yes?" Dumbledore leaned in, gazing over his spectacles.

"I think they did it." Kelly's eyes flicked to the door. She'd locked it, put a chair in front, a sticking charm, anything to keep anyone from wandering in. But could she be sure, it was safe, in the dark? Maybe they'd moved. Maybe someone was there. "It makes sense, right? Like, none of my friends are here." She wrapped her robe around herself and shakily stood. "Susan and Rachel and Mandy. I haven't even heard from them. Y'know what they are?"

"Well." Dumbledore's eyes followed Kelly as she padded to the door. "The only students by those names are Muggle-borns."

Kelly nodded, but she was focused on the door. The dull metal fastening was still shut fast. She tugged on the chair, but all it gave was a creak. Not even a sliver of light poured through the gaps in the door-frame. It was just her, the dark, and Dumbledore.

"And… Mandy was on the Quidditch Team. Now I'm in her place and it feels wrong." Kelly clutched the front of her robe. "She might be dead, and I'm wearing her uniform and taking her spot, and nobody wants to talk about her! They don't even say her name, Professor."

"Everyone deals with their pain in different ways, Miss Brewes." Dumbledore wasn't smiling, but his eyes glittered. "Myself, I enjoy knitting. Your team may be as afraid as you, afraid that speaking her name will dredge up those fond memories and bring with them the fears they're trying to bury. Or else of the association they'll gain by speaking fondly of a Muggle-born student."

Kelly shuffled to the wall and sat against one of the old school tables. She thought, and she thought and shook her head. How could she believe everything Dumbledore was telling her? He couldn't read minds when he was alive, so neither could his imitation. But he was old and wise, and he was Dumbledore.

"Maybe," Kelly muttered.

"Would it comfort you to know that your friends are safe?" Dumbledore asked. Kelly's head jerked up. "Because I can assure you that they were warned well in advance of… The unfortunate situation currently gripping Hogwarts. I made certain of that. The reason there are no Muggle-born students here is that some very brave witches and wizards took the time to warn them away from Hogwarts and from Britain itself. There is no doubt in my mind that you'll see your friends again."

Kelly stared at the portrait. There was a spark of hope, but the weight of everything was smothering it.

"This coming from a mind made of paint."

"The finest mind made of paint of this generation." Dumbledore raised a spindly finger. "If you'll forgive the hubris."

"I didn't know you were such an arse, Professor." A smile tugged at Kelly's lips.

"Then it seems you have better taste in literature than most of my detractors." Dumbledore sighed. "But this conversation is not about me. Miss Brewes, where did you get those scars?"

Kelly looked down at her arms, at her ankles, at wherever her flesh had been cut. She shuddered with the rush of memories.

"The Carrows." A basilisk couldn't have put more venom in the name. "I'm half-blood, y'know. They do. They point it out all the time. Have to make sure I get extra discipline, so I don't get any ideas." Kelly dragged the pad of her finger along a particularly pink scar. It stung, but so did the rest of her. "Or if I don't do well. Or if they had a bad day."

"The cruelty of the Carrows will not go unpunished, I assure you." Dumbledore said it with the kind of confidence Kelly could almost believe. "But those are not the scars I'm referring to."

There was that pressure again. Kelly hadn't noticed it lifting, but it was back. Tight around her lungs, her gut, and her throat. She looked at the cold stone under her toes, better than the eyes that would accept anything she said.

"It's..." Kelly's fingers trembled, even as she clenched them into a fist. "It's my pain. They can't have it."

"I understand." Dumbledore's voice didn't change an iota. "It is not what I would wish for any of my students, but… I understand. Do you know what drove you to it, Miss Brewes? Is it all to blame on the Carrows and their reign of terror?"

"It's every day, Professor." Kelly dared to look back up at the portrait. He was still the same man he was a few minutes ago, concerned, and kind, and willing to listen. "Every day, we have to listen to the Carrows. We have to worry about what they're going to say or do or threaten us with. Every day, we have to worry about what's going to come in the news, about people who've died or are going to be dead, or laws that are going to be put in place to make our lives worse."

"And every day the dread that it will be the last for someone you care for." Dumbledore's head swiveled to follow Kelly as the sound of shuffling feet filled the room. "I'm afraid much of Britain feels the same as you, Miss Brewes."

"That doesn't make it..." Kelly flexed the fingers of both hands. She couldn't start crying again. "That doesn't make it easier."

"I know." Dumbledore sighed. "But there must be some hope, despite how dire things seem, that there may be one day where you will be happy once more."

"I don't think there must." Kelly laid her hand flat against the grain of the desk by the window and peered out. The night was beautiful. That was easy for stars. They didn't have a care in the universe. "At the end of the year, we're gonna go back out to the real world. And it's gonna be the same people in charge, doing the same things that they did, and they aren't going to get better, so there'll be other Carrows, and other laws, and more friends that might just be dead.

"Maybe it won't just be all my friends with Muggles for parents. Maybe it will be everyone with just one, or everyone who's ever spent time with them, or people who spend too much time with centaurs or pixies or anything that's not a wizard. I don't know." Kelly swallowed, her throat dry. "Maybe I'll wake up, and I'll see that Mum's dead, and I won't even be surprised by it. I'll go to her grave, and I'll see her name next to Dad's and I…" The strength in her arms was failing her.

"I don't want to do that, Professor. I can't do it. There's nothing for me once I get out of Hogwarts. There's just more of the same, more misery, more friends and family leaving. There's nothing when we get to Christmas. There's nothing next week. There's not even anything tomorrow. It's just… More of this." Kell's eyes fell to the back of her hand, to the scars marring her flesh. "So what's the point?"

"The point, Miss Brewes, is that this day is not every day. The world did not wake up and decide to be what it is, and only that, until the end of time. It took people, quite unlike you, investing their lives into a terrible cause and trying to make it that way. There will come a day where those people are unhappy, where they have given in to despair, and you are once more content. Even after all you have been through, even after all you may go through soon, there will come a time where you can look at yourself in the mirror and say that you are happy."

"I don't..." Kelly looked back at the portrait and the kind eyes that were watching her. "I don't think so, Professor."

"But I do. And I believe that the same is the case for the people you care about. The pain you feel, and the fear, you are entitled to. You deserve no judgment for being human, Miss Brewes. But so too are you entitled to the belief that things may get better. Every day of suffering may feel like a trial, but look at how many you've survived so far. With every day you live, you carry light. However small it may feel, it is there, and it makes the world brighter."

Kelly stared wordlessly at Dumbledore. She could hear her heartbeat, feel his words sinking in.

"You may just be one girl, in one school, in one corner of a country in the corner of a world, but you are important, Miss Brewes. And with each day you survive this suffering, you become stronger as a person. That light inside you grows brighter. Perhaps it never matters in a way that will change the world, but it will matter to you, and to the people you care about and knowing that you're around may convince another not to surrender to the despair that's seizing them.

"Perhaps..." A smile flickered on Dumbledore's lips. "One day, you'll find a young woman who feels scared, and alone, and like the world is smothering her. And you'll be able to say the right words, at the right time, to save her life." He leaned back in his seat with a little groan. "Or perhaps not. I shan't judge you either way; I am, after all, just an imitation."

Kelly shook as she knelt to pick up her wand. She ran her fingers over the polished wood. She laid it against her forehead, focused past the pressure that was trying to envelop her, and let herself breathe.

With a flick of her wand, Kelly's clothes rushed to her. Her boots slid on, her robe fastened itself, and her hat fell on her head. She tucked her wand away and walked in front of the picture frame.

"Thank you, Professor," Kelly whispered. He understood, and so did she. "Will you… Will you still be here, if I need you?"

"Of course." Dumbledore's smile split his beard. "Help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it."

Kelly bowed her head to the portrait and strode to the door. She pulled the chair away, unlocked it, and stepped out into the halls of Hogwarts.

Dumbledore gazed out at the empty room with a twinkle in his eyes. The wood shuddered and shifted and he was gone, leaving a perfectly unadorned frame in his wake.


End file.
